Spectacular Le Mans and Canadian GP

Neither of those headlines sound like much but by now I presume everyone knows what happened in these two dramatic races on Saturday and Sunday. As predicted it was a battle royal between Audi and Peugeot, but nobody imagined the race would transpire the way it did. It was more like a Hollywood script than an actual race.

I have been a motor racing photographer since 1970 and when I saw Allan McNish's major shunt in the leading Audi within the first hour my heart missed a beat as flying bits from the disintegrating Audi headed towards photographers and marshals standing in a "safe" location. Luckily nobody was hurt. In case you have not seen the video clip it has gone viral on YouTube:

The second Audi loss later in the night proved how strongly Audi's innovative R18 TDI, with a one-piece carbon fiber monocoque, is constructed, when Mike Rockenfeller survived an even more car-destroying accident. He hit a barrier at about 165 mph, which brought out a 2.5 hour full-course caution period.

At that stage many were describing Audi's attempt to take it's tenth Le Mans victory as "disastrous." For good reason, as the only car left running was driven by the trio of drivers — Marcel Fässler (Switzerland), André Lotterer (Germany) and Benoît Tréluyer (France) — with the least Le Mans experience. They were up against three strongly running Peugeots. Suddenly Audi was the underdog against a French team in France. No wonder the final hours were so gripping as the lone Audi battled the three, then two Peugeots.

But as we all know Audi took the checkered flag just 13.854 seconds ahead of the Peugeot after 24 hours of extremely close racing. Audi came away with one of the most dramatic wins in Le Mans history and also made a star of the three drivers and the car's chief engineer – Leena Gade, a 35-year old woman from Britain. Congratulations to everyone on the Audi team.

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Kudos are also due to Americans at Le Mans. Despite losing the then leading Corvette to an accident in the 16th hour, the second Compuware Corvette C6.R driven by Olivier Beretta, Tommy Milner and Antonio Garcia took first place in the GTE Pro class beating out a Ferrari F458 Italia and the favorites-to-win BMW M3 GT.

The Larbre Competition Corvette C6R driven by Gabriele Gardel, Patrick Bornhauser and Julien Canal also won the GTE Am (Amateur) class. Special mention should go to the American team of Dave and Andrea Robertson, who along with Dave Murry took third place in their privately entered Ford GT. It was the first time since 1972 that a Ford has been on the podium at Le Mans and the first time since 1931 that a woman has been on the podium at Le Mans, in any class.

And then it was on to the Canadian Grand Prix, which started four hours after the finish of the Le Mans race and it turned out to be the longest Grand Prix in history. F1 fans that set their DVRs to record the race missed it, as there was a 2 hr 5 min red-flag pause because of monsoon-like rain. After that though, the race was scintillating. Jensen Button, in the Vodaphone McLaren-Mercedes managed to go from last place, after suffering a drive-through penalty and five pit stops, to grab the lead on the final lap by pushing – not literally – Sebastian Vettel, who had lead from the start, to make a minor slip on the slippery track. Wasn't it just two weeks ago that another Brit took the checkered flag on the very last lap having not lead a single lap up to that point?

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One of the best drives in the Canadian Grand Prix belonged to Michael Schumacher – it was great to see him back on form performing masterly in the horrible conditions—he looked set for his first podium finish in his Mercedes, but alas he ended up fourth as the two Red Bull Renault cars showed their superiority on the drying track.

Schumacher's comment after the race summed everything up nicely: "I am leaving this race with one eye laughing and one eye crying, as I am not sure if I should be excited or sad about it. Having been in second place towards the end, I would obviously have loved to finish there and be on the podium again. But even if it did not work out in the very end, we can be happy about the result and the big fight we put in. A good strategy after the red flag made it possible, and I am very happy for our team. I would also like to send a big compliment out to the spectators who stayed with us in those difficult circumstances for so long and even cheered us up. That was impressive, and I am glad that I could play my part in entertaining them."

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